PLYMOUTH, N.H. -- Four different players combined for the team's first 11 points as the Eastern Connecticut State University women's basketball team jumped to a nine-point lead after five minutes and never trailed in a 74-50 Little East Conference victory over Plymouth State University Saturday afternoon at Foley Gymnasium.
With its fourth straight win this year, Eastern (6-4, 3-0 LEC) remains one of two unbeaten teams in the Little East, along with LEC pre-season favorite Rhode Island College, also 3-0 in the conference. RIC kept pace with a 55-45 home win over Keene State College Saturday.
The victory is Eastern's 19th in a row and 37th in the last 38 meetings with Plymouth (1-7, 0-3 LEC), which has dropped six straight this year.
Saturday, the Warriors scored the first six points and led, 11-2, after the hosts missed eight of nine shots and turned the ball over four times on their first 13 possessions, with Eastern senior forward Aiyana Ward (Waterbury) coming up with two steals and sinking the first jumper of the game in that stretch.
Plymouth, picked last in the LEC pre-season poll, cut the gap to four in the opening minute of the second quarter, but led by senior guard Jenna Serrantino (Cromwell) and six-foot senior forward Anna Barry (Andover), Eastern used a 10-2 scoring run in a 31-point second quarter to pull away to a 27-point, 49-22, halftime lead.
In the second quarter, Barry had seven points, four rebounds and two steals, connecting on both of her field goals and three of four free throws. Serrantino converted all five of her free throws in the quarter and totalled nine points.
As a team in that second quarter, Eastern was 10-of-15 from the floor and 11-of-13 from the stripe that busted the game open and allowed a bench-clearing in the fourth quarter that featured five little-used players collecting a total of 29 fourth-quarter minutes.
In the game, Eastern equalled its season high with 19 free throws (on 22 tries), set a season mark with a 86.4 mark from the line and equalled its season best with only 15 turnovers.
All 14 players saw action, with first-year guard Elayna Comella (Warwick, RI) recording her first career field goal in the final 30 seconds. Excluding Kya Mayo (Middletown), who has seen regular action off the bench this year, five other first-year players saw 31 minutes of action and contributed eight points and seven rebounds.
Barry led Eastern with 15 points and nine rebounds. She nailed all six of her field goals and was 3-of-4 from the foul line. Serrantino had 11 points, three rebounds and three assists and Mayo ten points (4-of-4 from the stripe) and four rebounds. Senior guard Julie Keckler (Trumbull) had eight points, seven assists and four rebounds in 24 minutes (her second-lowest minutes total this year) and Ward nine points, six rebounds, three steals and no turnovers in 20 minutes.
Picked for second in the LEC pre-season poll, top-seeded Eastern trimmed No. 2 Rhode Island College, 49-44, in the LEC tournament title game in 2019-20. The Warriors and Anchormen meet in the front end of the home-and-home regular-season series Jan. 5 at Geissler Gym.Eastern faces Union College Jan. 1 in the first game of the Springfield College Naismith Classic at 7:30 p.m.